


Crisis Management

by Gin_Juice



Series: picture book [7]
Category: The Umbrella Academy (TV)
Genre: Dysfunctional Family, Family Dinners, Family Dynamics, Family Feels, Good Brother Luther Hargreeves, Good Sister Vanya Hargreeves, Klaus and Five are feuding and there will be no winner, Luther might be having an existential crisis, No Apocalypse, Post-Canon, or maybe he's just hungry, there is no way to tell
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-08-05
Updated: 2019-08-05
Packaged: 2020-08-10 03:54:23
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 7,773
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20128924
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Gin_Juice/pseuds/Gin_Juice
Summary: “Did you get light bulbs? Half the lights in the library are out.”“No. No, I did not get light bulbs.”“Tell me you got more toilet paper. We ran out this morning.”"Uh, well..."___________________________________________Luther realizes that not every team needs a leader, and that he and his brothers form one competent adult between them.





	Crisis Management

**Author's Note:**

> This is part of a series, but you don't need to read previous installments to follow along. Basically- The Apocalypse has been averted, and the kids are working on getting closer. Luther, Five, Klaus and the ghosts of Ben and (more recently) Dave live at the Academy together. Diego still lives at the gym. The ghost of a random old man drops in to check on them from time to time, and tries to steer them all towards better decisions and more responsible home ownership.

At the beginning of August, Diego announced that the gym had a mold problem, and that he—and all of his earthly possessions— would be moving into the Academy until it was under control.

“I get not wanting his mattress and sheets to get moldy, but why is he bringing the rest of it with him?” Allison asked Luther over the phone. “What exactly does Diego own that he thinks is worth stealing?”

“I don’t know, but it’s not a big deal,” he told her. “He doesn’t have that much stuff. It shouldn’t take four people any time at all to pack everything up.”

Except, the first thing Klaus had done upon arriving at the gym was to pick up a small set of weights and begin dancing around with them like they were maracas, breaking a lamp in the process. So he’d been banished to the van with a handheld vacuum to clean out the backseat.

But it shouldn’t have taken three people any time at all.

Only, it was a small space, and Luther was not a small guy, and it didn’t help that Five kept zipping all around him like a Chihuahua that was determined to be underfoot. And he didn’t want to break any more of Diego’s things—or any of Five’s toes—so he’d sat down on the bed to wrap the fragile items in newspaper.

But it shouldn’t have taken two people any time at all.

The thing was, though, that Diego was far more concerned with making sure all of his weapons were accounted for than with packing anything. So he’d hand Luther a single drinking glass, and then spend ten minutes rifling through drawers for a knife he’d just realized he hadn’t seen in weeks.

And really, it shouldn’t have taken Five any time at all, but… it _was_ taking him time. A lot of time.

Luther sat with the next sheet of newspaper ready in his lap and watched him drop a stick of deodorant into the box he was working on.

He peered down into it for a moment, then dumped everything out onto the floor.

“What’s wrong?” Luther asked.

Five jerked his head at the shelf behind him. “I had a thought. It would be better if I put those records at the bottom.”

“Oh.” Luther played with the ragged edge of the newspaper. This was the third time he’d packed and unpacked the same box. “Why?”

Five cast him a patronizing look. “Because it’s more efficient.”

Diego stood up from the small chest he’d been digging through, two more knives in hand.

“This one is part of a set,” he mumbled under his breath, rubbing his thumb over the handle.

He glanced at Luther, brows pinched. “I have to go look for something in my car. I’ll be right back.”

“But if it’s in your car, it’s not lost, right?” Luther reasoned, although he already knew it was hopeless. “Can’t you look for it later?”

“I don’t _know_ if it’s in my car, that’s why I have to check,” Diego informed him snippily. “It’ll take five minutes.”

Okay. Okay, they’d been at this for an hour, and had managed to pack up exactly one box of books. The boiler room was cramped and stifling hot and he needed to pee, but he couldn’t fit into the gym’s narrow bathroom stalls.

He didn’t even care about knocking over Diego’s stuff. Someone had to take charge here.

Luther began to rise to his feet, then fell backwards with a startled gasp as Five appeared in front of him, grabbed a stack of fitness magazines off the bed, and blinked back to the other side of the room.

…Right. The teleporting Chihuahua was still going to be a problem.

He shoved his hands under his thighs. This was starting to feel like one of those stress dreams where he had to complete a very important task, but couldn’t manage to make any progress on it no matter what he tried.

The door creaked open and Klaus stepped inside to lean over the railing.

“Okay, the van’s sparkling clean. Do you guys have any more busy work for me, or would you prefer I just go play in traffic?” he asked, looking sullen.

Five glanced up from the box he was packing with toiletries. “Is that my coffee? Don’t drink my coffee.”

Klaus held up the take-out cup in his hand. “What, this?”

Before Five could zap across the room and snatch it away, Klaus threw his head back and drained it in a single large gulp.

“No coffee here!” he said with a satisfied burp. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

Five’s eyes narrowed. Klaus was going to live to regret that, Luther thought.

Diego whipped one of the knives in his hand at the door, where it stuck.

“Want to go to my car and see if you can find another knife that looks like that?” He dug his hand into his back pocket for his keys. “It’s part of a matching pair, and I don’t…”

His face screwed up as he looked around the piles of clothing and papers and other assorted junk littering the floor.

“Wait. Where the fuck did my hunting knife go? I _just_ saw it.”

Luther’s heart sank. They were going to be here all day.

Klaus was also looking around the room, taking in the sight with clear disbelief.

“Jesus, what have you guys been doing while I was outside?” he asked. “Diego owns two outfits and one book, how is _none_ of it ready to go yet?”

“I have more stuff than that,” said Diego, though he was frowning at the mess like it had just occurred to him that this was perhaps not going as well as it could be.

“Maybe it would be done by now if we broke everything, but we’re taking a different approach,” Five said coolly.

He upended his box for the fourth time.

Klaus steepled his hands under his chin. “I have some constructive criticism.”

“Yeah?” Luther asked, desperation bleeding into his tone. Klaus wasn’t known for his good ideas, but he was willing to try anything that would speed this up.

“Yes. It’s that you guys are dumb and you’re waaay overthinking this.”

Five sat back on his heels and glared at him. “How are we dumb and overthinking things at the same time? It’s an oxymoron.”

“Well, that’s better than being a regular moron, isn’t it?” Klaus asked in a way that suggested he felt he’d just won an argument.

“What does that even mean? I can’t tell if you’re insulting me or yourself.”

Klaus ignored him. “Luckily, I am here to help.”

He pointed a dramatic finger at the ceiling. “Observe, _mes freres!”_

Luther watched in dismay as Klaus pirouetted down the steps and began scooping armfuls of things off the floor to cram into Diego’s dresser.

“Klaus, we’re taking everything out of there,” he protested. “It needs to go in boxes.”

“Why?” Klaus asked cheerily. “You might remember that you have super strength.”

Luther blinked. “Well… yeah, but it’ll be too awkward to maneuverer outside when it’s that heavy. I don’t want to drop it.”

“You might also remember that Five can warp everything to the parking lot.”

Five’s scowl was giving away to a look of begrudging respect.

“The drawers will fall out,” said Diego.

Klaus paused to shoot finger guns at him. “That’s what duct tape is for, daddio!”

Diego began gathering up his breakable possessions faster than Luther could wrap them, seeming intent on matching Klaus’s frantic pace, while Five hurried to drop the items too large for the drawers into boxes.

Klaus tried to get them all to sing ‘Whistle While You Work’ until Diego told him to shut up, and they were done in just over thirty minutes.

It was the laziest, most half-assed moving technique Luther could imagine, but he had to admit, it was kind of ingenious.

“Yay! Klaus saves the day!” Klaus cheered, throwing his arms up in victory. “Thank you, Klaus! We couldn’t have done it without you, Klaus! Stopping for ice cream on the way home is a great idea, Klaus!”

“It’s nine thirty in the morning,” said Diego. “You don’t need ice cream.”

“And you don’t need magazines from three years ago, but here we are,” muttered Five.

“I haven’t read them all yet. I have a life.”

“Name two things you’ve done in the last week that weren’t working out or mopping floors.”

“At least I have a fucking job! Jesus Christ, tell me one thing you’ve done all goddamn month that required you to go outside or—“

Klaus bounced on the balls of his feet and gave Luther a hopeful smile. “Ice cream?”

“Sure.” There wasn’t any place between here and the house that would be convenient, but he did owe him one.

“Great! I’m going to ride home with Diego, but I’ll take strawberry with rainbow sprinkles in a waffle cone, and if you get yourself butter pecan so we can share, it would be much appreciated. Also, I don’t have any money on me.”

Klaus hopped over one of the boxes on the floor and sailed out the door. “Thaaaanks!”

Luther raked a hand through his hair. He probably should have seen that coming.

{}{}{}{}{}

Luther felt as though all he’d done since returning to Earth was adjust to one change after another.

Dad was dead. Vanya had powers. Five was back and Ben had never really left, the world ended and then it didn’t, gravity was suddenly a thing again. It turned out leadership was an actual skill, not just a title that was bestowed upon you.

And he was doing his best to keep up, he really was, but… he’d never been great at adapting to new things, as their father had repeatedly noted in his journals.

It was just so _surreal_ at times, to be living in a house full of other people after hearing only his own voice for four years. Wonderful and soul-healing and everything he’d dreamed of, yes, but also… unpredictable.

He might come downstairs in the morning and find Diego bleeding all over the foyer, or conked out at the dining room table, or chugging orange juice straight out of the carton.

He almost had a heart attack every time Dave materialized unexpectedly, because as pleasant as Dave was, it was not pleasant at all to have a man with a big, bloody hole in the center of his chest pop up out of nowhere to ask if it was alright if he changed the TV channel to check the baseball scores real quick.

Five kept leaving sheets of equations all over the house and got angry if anyone touched them. Klaus kept stealing everyone’s socks when he ran out of clean laundry. Ben kept blinkering out of existence halfway through baking cookies or making bread, leaving the kitchen in shambles.

And worst of all, Pogo was gone.

He’d left for the Galapagos in the middle of June, heading up a study on some endangered species of bird none of them had ever heard of. He had been sticking to his own quarters in the months before that, too ashamed to face them after they’d discovered the depths of his complicity with their father’s schemes, and nobody else seemed to miss him—but Luther, for one, felt his absence keenly.

“Someone needs to go grocery shopping,” Five announced.

He was sitting at the kitchen table eating a bowl of plain tuna fish, since there was no mayonnaise to mix it with, or bread to put it on.

“I just _went _grocery shopping,” said Luther, examining the single kiwi in the fridge in consternation. “I went… last Thursday, I think?”

Five twirled his spoon, giving Luther an unimpressed look. “Funny thing about groceries— they aren’t a ‘one and done’ kind of purchase.”

Luther sighed and closed the refrigerator.

Keeping the kitchen stocked since Pogo’s departure had become a constant struggle. Who knew people ate so much?

Klaus meandered into the room and stopped short when he saw Five’s meager lunch.

“Oh, are we out of food again?” he asked without much surprise. “Nuts! Guess I’ll just have to have Oreos.”

Luther retrieved another can of tuna while Klaus rifled through the cabinets.

He glanced over his shoulder to where one of his ghostly companions must have been as he dug far into the back. “Well, what do you suggest I eat, then, dearest? They say it’s a bad idea to go to the grocery store when you’re hungry, you know.”

“Where’s Mom?” Luther asked as he tried to locate the can opener. “I haven’t seen her since breakfast.”

“I’d end up buying chips, and cupcakes, and instant mac and cheese,” Klaus was saying, “and… and I’d kill for any of those right now, oh my GOD will someone please go shopping already?”

“You have legs,” Five pointed out.

“So do you, but I don’t see you hauling bags back here with your no-car-having ass, either.”

Five frowned at his back. “The DMV is still reviewing my appeal. I might be able to get my license as early as September.”

“Or as late as your sixteenth birthday. Which I think calls for a very special party, by the way!”

“Guys? Do you know where Mom is?”

Five leaned forward, though Klaus still wasn’t looking at him. “If you even say the words Sweet Sixteen--”

“Sweet Sixteen! Now what?”

Klaus found the package of Oreos and turned to stick his tongue out at Five. In a flash, he was standing next to him and grabbing the cookie out of his hand.

“NO! My Oreo! That’s the last one!”

Five swallowed, his eyes bright with glee. “No Oreos here.”

Klaus’s mouth fell open, then his expression hardened. “So it’s going to be like that, huh?”

Five smiled at him, over-wide and mocking. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

Luther turned the can of tuna over in his hands. He really felt like he should intervene, but he didn’t have a great track record for settling disagreements between his siblings. Maybe this would just sort of… fizzle out.

…He could dream.

Mom walked in then, humming and carrying her cross-stitch supplies.

“Hello, children!” she said as she stowed them in a drawer. “Are you all ready for lunch?”

“Yes!” said Klaus. “Feed me, mother, before I starve to death!”

“Actually, I need to make a grocery run,” said Luther. “Is there anything you need me to get? I don’t really know what to buy.”

“Oh, just the usual things,” she said unhelpfully as she began rummaging around for something to make Klaus. “It will have to wait until after your lessons, though, dear.”

Five raised an eyebrow at her, and Klaus turned to exchange a look with an invisible Dave.

“Uh… what? Mom, we’re thirty.”

She gave him a questioning smile, as though asking what his point was.

Luther shifted his weight around uneasily. “There are no lessons anymore,” he reminded her.

“Oh.” She blinked. “Yes, of course. My, how silly of me! What would you like for lunch, Klaus dear?”

Well, that was… weird, but now Mom was smiling and humming and acting her usual self, so there wasn’t much reason to worry, he guessed. Sending them off to their lessons was probably just a residual part of her programming.

He could never, ever say so out loud to his siblings without sparking a fight, but sometimes he missed that, the relative simplicity of their childhood. The structure. The sense of purpose. The comfort of always knowing what to do next.

Being able to solve any problem or make any decision just by asking himself _‘What would Dad want?’_

“Oh, Luther. I am not the one to ask for advice on household management,” Allison told him when he complained over the phone that the cable had been cut off because they all thought somebody else had paid the bill. “I have people for that.”

She laughed. “God, I’m such a spoiled brat, aren’t I? _‘I have people for that.’_ I sound like a parody of Joan Crawford.”

Luther eased back carefully in the desk chair, feeling outsized for the study’s elegant furniture. “I’m pretty sure everyone thinks _I’m_ our person for that,” he said hopelessly.

Allison laughed harder.

It was three weeks since Diego had moved in, and Luther had just returned home from a marathon shopping session. He’d gotten groceries. He’d gotten trash bags. He’d gotten toothpaste, and he had even remembered which fancy shampoo Klaus liked.

It was a little stupid, but for the first time he could remember, he felt like he was actually living up to the responsibilities of a leader.

“Did you get lightbulbs?” Five asked as he picked through the bags on the kitchen table. “Half the lights in the library are out.”

Luther rubbed at one eye with the heel of his palm. “No,” he sighed. “No, I did not get lightbulbs.”

“Hm.” Five pulled a bar of dark chocolate out of a bag. “This for me?”

“Yeah.”

A ghost of a genuine smile flickered across his face. “Thanks.”

No sooner had he unwrapped it than Klaus, who’d been unpacking canned goods, lunged across the table and licked it right up the side.

“No candy here!”

“Listen,” Luther started, trying to sound authoritative. “Don’t—“

Five threw the chocolate bar at Klaus’s face. “If you’re going to get your germs all over it, at least eat the fucking thing!”

Klaus tilted his head and batted his lashes. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

“You guys—“

“Luther, dear, is that you?” Mom opened the door to the kitchen. “Oh, I thought I heard you come in! And now we can have a real supper instead of hotdogs again, how lovely!”

As she crossed the kitchen to give him a kiss on the cheek, he noticed that one of her shoes was pink, and the other was black.

The sounds of angry stomping echoed down the hall, and then Diego appeared in the doorway wearing only a pair of boxers and a scowl.

“Will you _stop FUCKING YELLING?”_

“Language,” Mom scolded, giving a censorious look to a package of raw chicken breast.

Five rolled his eyes and zapped himself to the fridge to start putting away the produce. “Nobody was yelling,” he said. “I keep telling you—if you really need total silence to sleep, either stop prowling the streets all night or invest in some ear plugs.”

“I was using my inside voice,” Klaus agreed. “Also, Ben says nice nipple ring.”

Diego crossed his arms self-consciously over his chest. “He didn’t say that.”

Ben suddenly popped into existence next to the sink, and Luther dropped a box of spaghetti in surprise.

“Nice nipple ring.”

Diego gave him a dirty look before his gaze came to rest on the shopping bags.

“You never said you were going to the store.” He glared at Luther through sleep-bleared eyes. “Tell me you got more toilet paper. We ran out this morning.”

“Uh, well…”

Ben snapped his fingers. “Oh! That reminds me, the leak in Dad’s office is getting worse. When’s the plumber coming?”

“What leak? What plumber?” Luther asked in bewilderment.

Ben frowned at Klaus, who held up his hands defensively. “Don’t look at me! I told Diego about it.”

“What the hell, Klaus?” Diego burst out. “You didn’t call anybody?”

“_You_ didn’t call anybody?”

“No! I thought you already did it and you were just letting me know!”

“The wallpaper is starting to peel off,” Ben informed them.

“What do I know about plumbers? I can’t handle that kind of responsibility!”

Mom was removing eggs from the carton and humming as she placed them loose on the refrigerator shelves.

“Someone still needs to go get toilet paper and lightbulbs,” Five called across the room.

Luther pressed a hand to his forehead.

He was not a leader. There was no leader here.

This house was spiraling out of control.

{}{}{}{}{}

Luther had just poured himself a cup of coffee—black, because Klaus had used the last of the creamer for his cereal, since they were already out of milk—and turned around in time to see Five appear in the kitchen brandishing a toothbrush holder full of pretzel sticks.

“Why did you do this?” he demanded, glaring at Klaus. “Where’s my toothbrush?”

“I dunno,” he said, voice muffled by Cocoa Puffs. “I didn’t take it.”

“Oh, really?” Five shook the cup at him. “Luther got up this morning and decided to hide it? Diego thought it was time to start playing practical jokes on people?”

Diego flipped a page in the newspaper. “Leave me out of this.”

Klaus swallowed, frowning. “Maybe?”

“Where. Is. My. _Toothbrush_.” Five hissed.

“I don’t know!”

He slammed the cup down on the table and zapped himself over to the cabinets, mumbling under his breath.

“So, while we’re all here, I was thinking that maybe we could have a family dinner on Sunday,” said Luther.

He sort of hated their family dinners—Allison would try too hard to keep up conversation, Klaus would smoke at the table, Diego was always on some weird new diet someone at the gym had told him about—but it seemed like a leaderly thing to suggest.

Plus, none of them had seen Vanya in several weeks since Allison was busy recording for her voice-acting role in L.A., and he wanted to make sure she was still alive.

“Ben says he wants to try to make a pot roast,” said Klaus.

“I’m not eating beef right now,” Diego said without looking up from the paper. “Fish only.”

“Ben says too bad, he’s making pot roast.”

“Bullshit he did.”

“Oh my God, he _did_, why is everybody jumping on me today?”

As though to accentuate his point, Five zapped behind him and reached over his shoulder to dump salt into his cereal bowl.

“No cereal here.”

Klaus uttered a cry of frustration, flinging his hands into the air. “I didn’t take your fucking toothbrush!”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

Luther looked beseechingly to Diego, who made a point of bringing the newspaper closer to his face.

“Now, now, boys, no fighting.” Mom turned away from the counter, holding up the coffee pot. “Would you like some, Five dear?”

He dropped into the seat next to Diego, still glowering at Klaus.

“Please.”

Luther cleared his throat. “So, we’re all in agreement? Dinner on Sunday? Someone should give Vanya a call.”

“I’m not coming if we’re having beef,” Diego insisted.

“So, what, you’re going to sit in your room and sulk while everybody else eats?” asked Klaus. “Maybe write some angsty poetry while you’re at it?”

“Listen, I’m not going to—“

They never found out what Diego wasn’t going to do. Everyone’s attention was redirected to Mom, who was pouring Five’s coffee all over the table with a cheerful smile.

She took a step back, neatly avoiding the puddle dripping onto the floor. “Drink up, now!”

They all watched it seep into the business section of the newspaper and pool around Luther’s plate of eggs.

Five looked to Klaus with a strained expression. “I believe you about not replacing my toothbrush with pretzels,” he said curtly.

Diego’s gaze shifted from the coffee to Luther. “We’re not switching her off!” he snarled.

“What? I wasn’t going to say we—“

“Don’t say anything!” he barked. His face was flushed with misplaced fury, but there was an underlying quiver in his voice. “We’re not switching her off!”

“Mom,” Klaus whispered, looking stricken.

“Diego, I’m not going to say we should shut her down over spilled coffee!”

He wasn’t going to say they should shut her down over anything less than a tri-state murder spree, honestly. It had been horrible enough to see the first time.

Diego pounded a fist on the table, causing Klaus to jump in his seat. “It’s not just coffee! You know it’s not just coffee! She’s been acting strange and—“

He broke off to bury his face in his hands.

Mom drifted over and stroked his hair. “What’s wrong, dear?” she asked in concern.

Klaus made a small, distressed noise.

He was right. Diego was right. All the little things were adding up, but they’d lost Dad and they’d lost Pogo and he hadn’t been able to admit to himself that maybe they were going to lose Mom, too.

There was no denying it now, though—something was wrong with her.

“Oh, for fuck’s sake,” Five snapped. “Will you all stop being so dramatic? She’s a machine, and machines are always fixable.”

Diego dropped his hands, glaring at him with red-rimmed eyes. “She’s not just a machine, she’s our _mother_.”

Five shrugged and rose from his chair. “She’s both. I’m sure Pogo left notes somewhere on how to maintain her.”

Klaus’s eyes widened, and Luther felt nausea roil through his stomach.

“_Maintain_ her,” Diego seethed. “Maintain her! How can you be so cold?”

Five frowned at him. “Not cold. Rational. I figure somebody around here has to be.”

He turned to Mom and extended a hand. “Shall we?”

She smiled and took it.

{}{}{}{}{}

The next few hours were tense.

Diego, who had been awake for close to an entire day by then, stomped to the exercise room and locked the door. Luther fully expected to find holes in everything inside of it whenever he emerged.

Klaus made Dave corporeal and curled up against him on the sofa in the sitting room, where Dave petted his hair as he binge-watched John Hughes movies for comfort.

Luther tried to do some gardening as a distraction, but was soon joined by a morose Ben. He asked what books he was reading in an attempt to take his mind off things, and found himself listening to an excruciatingly detailed description of the latest fantasy series he’d discovered.

“So then, the sixth book wasn’t as good, I thought,” Ben was saying while Luther weeded the flower patch.

“I mean, it’s still alright, but they introduced these new creatures that are pretty much vampires, except they gave them a different name. And it’s like… who are you trying to impress here? Just call them vampires. We all know that’s what they are, no need to reinvent the wheel.”

“Right,” Luther agreed. How many books were _in_ this series?

“Yeah. They did do a lot more world-building with the elf kingdom, though, and it was a little derivative of Tolkien, but —“

Five blinked into the middle of the yard.

“Done.”

Luther raised his head and Ben swallowed hard.

“She—really?” Ben asked, making anxious hand gestures that didn’t actually mean anything. “And she’s—you know—“

“Back to normal,” confirmed Five.

Luther let out a breath he thought he’d been holding since that morning.

“What was wrong with her? Something bad?”

Five shoved his hands into his pockets. “I’m hardly a robotics engineer,” he said drily. “Pogo’s notes had some simple fixes, to stop codes from running in infinite loops and to restore her settings to a more stable state.”

“Which means…?” prompted Ben.

“I turned her off and turned her back on again.”

Well. It was nice to know there was such an easy solution, even if it was a little disconcerting to think it was the exact same solution for a stereo that was making a funny noise.

“Look at this way—we’ll never have to worry about putting her in a nursing home,” Allison said when he related the story to her over the phone that night. “Just don’t let Five think he can start tinkering with her when he gets bored. We don’t need Mom to be outfitted with a rocket launcher.”

“He wouldn’t do that,” Luther said, a little doubtfully.

“Well, maybe not that in particular. But you know how he gets with his science projects.”

Luther wound the phone cord around his finger. “How would I stop him? He doesn’t listen to me.”

There was a thoughtful hum on the other end. “You know what, you’re right—_you_ shouldn’t say anything. Talk to Vanya about it, and ask her to pass it on. He gives at least half a shit if she gets mad at him.”

“True.” Luther frowned down at the desk. “That actually might work, but… Well, you remember how I was trying to get everyone together for dinner on Sunday? I’m not sure she’s coming.”

“Ohhh, no, she’ll be there. I talked to Ben on the phone the other day and told him he should call her and tell her what he’s making. He’s super excited about cooking for everyone, so, you know. Hard to bail on that.”

She sighed into the phone. “And I _am_ aware of how manipulative that is, but I’m going to keep telling myself it’s for a good cause.”

Luther smiled into the phone. “Thanks. I’ll tell you it is, too.”

He went to bed that night feeling more content than he had in weeks. Allison always had a way of making sense of things.

Then the next morning Klaus poured hot sauce on Five’s blueberry muffin and fled the scene shrieking “DON’T BREAK MY STUFF!” after Five vanished into parts unknown, and chaos reigned once more.

“There are plenty more muffins!” Luther remarked to no one in particular. “He could just take a different one!”

“It’s about more than muffins now,” said Dave. “It’s been about more than muffins for a while.”

“Can’t you stop them?” Luther begged. “Klaus listens to you.”

Dave fixed him with a sad smile over the sports section. “Luther. Buddy. I can’t tell you what happens when an immovable object meets an unstoppable force, but I do know that if I get in between them, I’m the one getting pancaked.”

On the other side of the room, Diego belched and wiped the back of his hand across his mouth. He was clutching an open carton of orange juice.

Luther made a face. “You want a glass for that?”

Diego held eye contact with him while he took another swig.

{}{}{}{}{}

“Ta-da!”

Ben placed the roast on top of the stove, glowing with pride. Luther felt a little squeamish watching him grab things from the oven with his bare hands, but he’d assured him that it didn’t hurt.

“Smells great,” said Dave as he gathered up the table settings. He grinned at Ben like they were sharing a private joke. “Can’t wait to watch everyone eat it.”

“Me either,” muttered Diego, eyeing the pan with obvious longing.

Klaus strolled in carrying yesterday’s mail and tapped his cheek to ask for a kiss as Dave passed by en route to the dining room.

“Attention, please!” he called. “A dearly departed busybody has just informed me that we’re due to have our gas meter read. Why he feels that worrying about our utilities is a good way to spend his afterlife is beyond me, but clearly, this matter is important enough to warrant a special announcement. Updates to follow.”

He tossed the mail onto the table and turned to glare at nothing, hands on his hips. “Happy now?”

“Wait, will the person who comes to check it know where the meter is?” Luther wondered out loud. “Because I don’t.”

Diego rolled his eyes and popped a crouton into his mouth.

“I think it’s in the basement,” said Ben, turning around. “I’m pretty I’ve—“

He was cooking fish for Diego on the stovetop, was the thing. Flounder, Luther thought. He bumped the pan with his elbow, and there was a yellow wave of grease that hissed and cracked as it met the open flame below, and then—

“Oh, SHIT! Shitshitshitshit—“

Ben flapped his hands, turning in panicked circles. “What the fuck do you do for a grease fire, I forget!”

Klaus dove for Diego’s glass of water, then reared back like an unseen force had yanked him away. “No?” he questioned the empty space next to him. “Then _what?!”_

“S-s-s-“ Diego was saying, already springing from his chair. “S-s-“

He made a strangled noise, shook his head, and darted to the cabinets.

“Oh my God, oh my God,” Ben was chanting.

“Salt water!” proclaimed Klaus.

The fire spread as the grease oozed, flaring higher and brighter all the while, and Luther was frozen.

_What would Dad want me to do? What would Dad want me to do? _He’d want him to put it out, of course, but he couldn’t recall how because he was a massive failure. Not a leader of any kind, just a car stuck in the mud, uselessly spinning its wheels and letting the house burn down.

God, he was worthless, he was stupid, he couldn’t think, he—

Diego skidded across the room to the stove, digging a knife into something he had wedged under his arm. He dumped it over the flames, and they died down almost instantly.

“Ohhhh, _regular_ salt!” Klaus said in a tone of realization. He smiled at Diego, looking impressed he’d worked out the solution to this puzzle so quickly. “I got it half right.”

The door swung open, and Dave froze at the sight of the stove.

“Uh. What happened in here?”

“Oh, Ben tried to set the house on fire, that’s all.” Klaus stepped towards him and pulled on the lapels of his vest. “We almost died. Diego saved us. I_ could_ have saved us if certain ghosts gave clearer instructions. No big deal.”

“I’m sorry,” whispered Ben, pressing a trembling hand to the side of his face. “I’m so sorry.”

“It’s n-n-n-“ Diego grunted in frustration and suddenly became very interested in his knife.

“It’s okay, Ben,” Dave soothed. “These things happen.”

He gave a meaningful look to Klaus, who scrunched up his face, but released his clothing.

“Come on, master chef,” he said cheerfully, turning to their white-faced brother. “Let’s get the table set up. No candlelight for ambiance, though.”

Dave nudged him with his elbow.

“…And don’t worry about trying to murder us all, accidents happen, what’s a little arson between family, yada yada,” he added with a roll of his eyes as he scooped up the salad bowl.

Still, he gave Ben a reassuring squeeze on the shoulder as they left the room.

“Your wrist okay?” Dave asked Diego once they were gone, mimicking the odd angle he held it at. “Did you get burned?”

“B-barely.”

Dave’s eyes darted to the left and he gestured at thin air. “This guy says nice work, by the way. It could have been a lot worse.”

Diego’s lips quirked just the smallest bit before he schooled his face back into his usual tough-guy scowl. He allowed Dave to lead him to the sink to run cool water over his burn with only a token grumble.

“You alright, Luther?” Dave asked over his shoulder.

“I…”

No.

“Yeah. Yeah, I’ll… go tell Five we’re almost ready to eat.”

{}{}{}{}{}

Family dinner was less terrible than usual.

Vanya was in a sociable mood, smiling at Klaus’s dramatic re-enactment of Diego’s heroics in the face of a small kitchen fire, and enduring Five’s diatribe about spelling errors in the neighborhood newsletter with good humor.

“You grumpy little old manboy,” Klaus said affectionately. “What’s next, are you going to start taking down license plate numbers when cars drive too fast? Yelling at children for riding bikes on the sidewalk?”

Five gave him a look that could have curdled milk. “I didn’t yell, I told them to slow down. We have elderly neighbors, you know.”

“Like you.” Klaus reached over to tap him on the nose. “Boop!”

“Why don’t we have dessert?” interjected Dave. “I’ll go get it.”

“Allow me,” grumbled Five, his eyes narrowed to slits. “I could use a walk.”

He popped out of the room and Ben began telling Vanya about a biography of Antonio Stradivari he’d recently read, but Luther wasn’t listening.

He was feeling peculiar that evening. A bit like he had when he’d first woken up in his new body, or after returning from space—off-kilter, out-of-step, like everything around him was slightly wrong.

Only, it wasn’t everything around him that was wrong. It was him.

He jolted in his seat when Five reappeared with a serving tray.

“What kind of cake is this?” Diego asked as he began handing out the plates. Luther could practically see him counting grams of sugar and fat in his head.

“Devil’s food with chocolate frosting,” said Ben. “Mom made it.”

“…Oh.” He studied the slice in front of him. “Maybe I’ll have half a piece.”

Luther had just taken a forkful when Klaus began choking down at the other end of the table.

“Why is it so spicy?” he wheezed, grabbing the glass of water Dave was offering him. “What the fuck did she put in it, cayenne pepper?”

“Mine tastes fine,” said Vanya, staring down at her plate in confusion.

Five watched him splutter and cough with a smirking smile. “No dessert here.”

Dave sighed, and Diego, still riding high on being the hero of the hour, shook his head in lofty judgement.

“OOH!” Klaus howled, tears leaking from the corners of his eyes. “You little hobgoblin!”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

“Me neither,” said Vanya, glancing in concern between the two of them. “What’s going on?”

“They keep messing with each other’s food,” Ben explained with obvious frustration. “It’s been going on for like a month now, and _you guys_—you need to stop.”

“What? No, tell _him_ to stop! We’re supposed to be a team, _Ben,_ and this is so much worse than anything I did to—“

“You started this whole thing, may I remind you, and all I’m doing is retaliating for—“

“Oh my God, that’s enough!” Ben cried. “Listen! It doesn’t matter who did what, you need to knock it off! This is so petty and immature, and it’s only a matter of time before one of you straight-up poisons the other, because you both take things way too far!”

Klaus blinked. “We wouldn’t poison each other,” he said in surprise. “It’s all in good fun.”

Five scanned the ceiling, suddenly unwilling to meet anyone’s gaze.

“Stop it either way,” insisted Ben. “It’s a waste of food, if nothing else.”

Klaus looked to Dave for help, who shook his head. “I’m with Ben, sweetheart. The joke has run its course.”

Klaus sighed. “Al-_right_,” he muttered. He gave Five a sulky look from under his lashes. “Truce?”

Five hazarded a glance at Vanya, who was staring at him like he was stranger wearing her brother’s face. “…Fine.”

Luther rifled a hand through his hair, feeling even more unbalanced. A month of squabbling, resolved with just a few words. How could Ben do that so easily? Why couldn’t _he_ do that?

Vanya was watching him. When their eyes met, she quickly looked away.

Mom wandered in soon afterwards to clear away the dishes, and they dispersed across the house. Diego offered to help her. Ben’s favorite show was on. Five went to the library, and Klaus dragged Dave upstairs to help him choose which of his new outfits he should model for Vanya.

“How’s the garden coming?” she asked Luther as she rose from her chair.

He shrugged. “The same.”

“Oh. Okay.” She hesitated, half in and half out of her seat, an odd look on her face. “Show me anyway?”

The evening was warm and the sky was an indeterminate pink-orange color, and he took in a deep breath of the fresh, loamy scent of earth. That was something nobody ever mentioned about space, that there were no smells.

“You, um. You were quiet at dinner,” Vanya remarked as he led her to the tomato plants. “Is… something wrong?”

He looked down at her. Her sad, serious little face was closed up tight and her shoulders were hunched around her ears. It was almost palpable, how much she didn’t want to have this conversation.

“I miss Dad,” he said, though he was certain that wasn’t what he’d intended to say.

Vanya winced. She was possibly the worst person to admit such a thing to, but she didn’t draw back. Vanya would stay and let him talk to her about any number of things that hurt her to hear, he realized, because she thought she deserved it.

“I mean. Not _him_, him,” he tried to explain with a touch of desperation. “It’s just… You know Pogo’s gone. And things have been kind of chaotic. It’s so much harder to take care of everything around here than I thought, and there’s always more stuff to buy and more bills to pay and I don’t know where our gas meter is, and… and every time something goes wrong, I can’t figure out what to do. And Diego backwashes into the orange juice container.”

He paused. “I miss someone being in charge, I guess. That’s all I meant.”

Vanya studied her shoes for a long moment. A lawnmower hummed in the distance. He might have just really screwed up, he thought.

“After I moved out,” she said haltingly, “I didn’t pay my taxes for three years. I didn’t know how.”

“I’ve never paid taxes,” he confessed. “I’ve never had a job, so…”

“And I didn’t register to vote until I was twenty-five, I think?” She screwed up her mouth like she was chewing the inside of her lip. “I didn’t know how to do that, either.”

“I’m still not registered to vote. Dad didn’t want me to get called to jury duty.”

Anyone else would have laughed at him for saying that out loud, but Vanya nodded like it made perfect sense.

“Sometimes I used to think I should give up and just come back here,” she said softly. “It got easier, but… well, I don’t think being an adult ever really gets _easy_.”

“Right.” Luther scratched at his ear and tried to muster a smile. “Some people seem to be managing pretty well, though.”

“Some people have more practice,” she countered, then grabbed at her elbows, awkward once more. “And you know, it’s better if… I don’t think… Most people don’t have somebody running their lives for them.”

She glanced at him briefly as though checking to see if he understood what she was getting at. He did not.

“One of the good things about living with other people is that you can… share the burden, sort of?” she hedged. “You know, someone makes sure the bills get paid, someone else is good at fixing things when they break. It’s a… a team effort, I guess?”

Oh. _Oh._

All this time—for his whole life, maybe—he’d been feeling like every time someone else had to step in to handle something, it meant that he had failed. But it didn’t mean that, did it? It only meant that the other person had succeeded.

And, true, their collective failures had been outnumbering their successes by a lot lately, but it was a relief to think the blame wasn’t all his.

Besides. Vanya said it got easier, and she would know.

He looked down at her. “I have no idea how you live alone,” he confessed. “I couldn’t do it. Well, I guess in space I did, but that was… different.”

And bad. _Boy_ did space suck. Never again.

Vanya shrugged. “I have no idea how Allison was able to have a child,” she told him with a wistful little smile. “I’d be terrified. I feel like I can barely be responsible for myself, half the time.”

“Oh, well. Allison doesn’t take care of all the day-to-day stuff, you know,” he said seriously. “She has people for that.”

The back door banged open.

“Vanya! There you are! Stop playing in the dirt and come tell me how awesome my butt looks in my new pants!”

Her lips quirked up at the corner. “I’m being summoned,” she said. “You, um… You’re okay?”

He smiled. “Yeah. I’m good.”

Better than she knew.

{}{}{}{}{}

“My flight is booked!” Allison sang into the phone. “I should be getting in at two on Thursday.”

“Good.” Luther smiled. It was funny—he’d gone over a decade without seeing any of his siblings, but now a month felt like far too long. “I’ll pick you up at the airport.”

“Sounds like a plan.” She hesitated. “And what should I expect when I get to the house? Will there be food and running water, or should I get ready to rough it?”

Her tone was teasing, but he knew her well enough to tell that there was a kernel of real worry in there.

“We’re good,” he promised. “Five set up automatic payment for the bills after that shut-off notice from the electric company.”

And Luther had put a magnetized notepad on the fridge, with instructions for everyone to write down whatever they noticed they needed around the house. He’d been going shopping every Tuesday, and the new system was working out pretty well.

Klaus kept putting ridiculous things on the list, like ‘a dozen Hula Hoops’ or ‘a surprise,’ but Mom was much more helpful since being rebooted. Her first suggestion had been a glass pitcher for the orange juice. It was heavy, and too unwieldy to drink from directly.

“How about the leak in Dad’s office?” Allison asked. “You guys ever get that fixed?”

“Oh, yeah. Dave and this other ghost took care of it.”

And then Ben had done a truly horrendous job of fixing the dry wall, but that was a problem for another day. Or never, because who actually cared?

“Great! Where would Diego store his stuff if mold invaded the Academy, I wonder? I don’t think Vanya has the space for ten million copies of the same shirt.”

Luther studied the top of the desk with a small frown. “Yeah. You know the gym has a roach problem now?”

“Seriously?”

“Uh-huh. He said they’re everywhere in there, so he can’t move back yet.”

Allison hummed into the phone. “First the mold, then the mice, and now roaches. I can’t believe what bad luck they’re having! Like, literally. I don’t believe it.”

“Yeah, it’s pretty crazy, right?”

“Mm. Maybe they’ll have a plague of locusts next. Can’t move back in and share a room with locusts, you know, gotta stay a little longer.”

Luther glanced at the door to make sure it was still closed. “I don’t think Diego’s a very good janitor,” he confided in a low voice.

Allison laughed so loud he had to hold the phone away from his ear.

**Author's Note:**

> So this ended up being long af, but I had a lot of ground to cover and Luther is sort of a difficult character to write. So earnest! So well-intentioned! So bad at everything that isn't moon-related!
> 
> Just a Very Good Boy with a heart of gold and the body of a gorilla. And the emotional intelligence of neither.


End file.
